Open Primaries

Monday, March 28, 2011

Debate on Top Two Open Primary Continues

Ken Beingenheimer has been running a series on Top Two. The debate continues here:

H. Sol: [Opposes Top Two because it] “puts more power into the hands of party insiders.”

Bill: Actually, the exact opposite is true. As I wrote in The Hankster, the California GOP is in a panic precisely because they have just realized that Prop 14 takes away some of the special privileges it once had as a so-called “qualified” party. Party elites and insiders can’t control who gets on the ballot or who uses the label “Republican.” Anybody who registered to vote as a “Republican” can use that label on the ballot.

This reduces the significance of the Party’s precious label. So now, they are no more than one private organization among many. They realize that if they are to have any chance of their official “Republican” candidate standing out among all the other “Republicans,” they have to agree in the primary stage on one candidate per office and back him or her to the hilt.

This is their response to their loss of power, and it does not make up that loss. The Republican Party is a wounded lion in California, and desperately struggling to survive. Prop 14 is working extremely well!